Grief, the Lung, and the Leader

Paul here

Pablo Picasso: “Weeping Woman", 1937

Last week, I was preparing to write a seasonal post about Winter and the element of Water, but after seeing the near-universal impact of the election on the communities around me, I was struck by the fact that there is a need to fully grieve the changes taking place in the world and socio-political disarray everywhere from the local to global level before moving into the dark, reflective period of winter and the water element.

When we think of grief, most often there is an aversion to the emotion, as it is (correctly) associated with periods of mourning: death, dispossession, loneliness and sudden, difficult changes. It is important to remember, however, that grief is the body's way of letting the waves of pain these moments bring up wash over and through us, so that we can come to terms with the world as it is, in spite of how we would like it to be. The tears we cry are a sharing of this pain, allowing it to leave our innermost world of thoughts and travel out into the world as a prayer: a heartfelt request for healing, a vulnerable admission of anguish at the way the world is. Grief is in fact the process of our body releasing this pain, but it must be felt as it departs.

As the waves of personal and collective grief and sadness move through us, the crying - the letting go of tears - slowly loosens the tight feeling of constricted emotion in our chest and throat, allowing for a further letting go of paralyzing emotional pain.

So, to honor the collective need to process the pain of current events, this is an invitation to grieve: individually, with family, friends, community members, even strangers. This is a moment to explore the deep transformative potential of grief through the lens of East Asian Medicine.

With every breath we take, we are drawing in vital, life-giving air to our Lungs. But at the same time we take in toxins: from simple organic compounds like carbon dioxide to synthetic chemicals that are increasingly present in the air across the globe. It is the job of the Lungs to discern how to best support our body: what to take in and what to let go of, to release back into the world. 

It is especially important to recognize that whatever we let go of is not "bad" or even necessarily harmful to life overall: it simply is not in service to our body, so we release it back to the world, creating an opportunity for those "toxins" to find a place where they might give life and be transformed. As we all know, the carbon dioxide we breathe out that no longer serves our body is air to the trees and plants, who drink it in and, in turn, send oxygen back to us. Everything is constantly being transformed by the Lungs: transformed into vital energy in our body and, as it circulates in our blood, transformed into something that can go on to nourish other forms of life. By considering the Lungs in this way, we can see how letting go of what does not nourish us is in fact an act of nourishment to others: we are all sharing the precious gift of breath.

 Grief 

When it comes to grief, it is the same: grief represents the pain of an emotional experience that hasn’t been released, and that no longer nourishes us. Think of the departure of a friend, or death of a pet: all the dreams and hopes we held in our hearts for continued acquaintance and comfort become reminders of something that is now missing from our lives. This is not to suggest we should erase the memories of loved ones—quite the contrary! However, by "letting go" of these painful feelings through our tears and the long, slow process of grief, we are opening ourselves to being nourished by what still remains: the cherished memories and feelings, the hope and inspiration of how we can carry these memories with us and create something beautiful in the world. "Inspiration" because that is what the Lungs help us do once we let go of the things that no longer nourish us, in a soothing regular rhythm: we let go, then we take a deep breath to bring in what is new, vital and lifegiving to prepare us for and propel us through whatever comes next.

“grief represents the pain of an emotional experience that hasn’t been released, and that no longer nourishes us.”

Bringing it back to this moment in time, and the disruption done to our personal narratives and values as well as collective hopes and dreams, the need to grieve the changing world is real. In fact, all of these needs are completely valid and real: the need to cry, to feel the beauty of those dreams and wishes that things could be different, to watch those dreams dashed against the hard surface of reality again and again until they break apart and flow out with our tears in a painful release of something so precious that never had a chance to flourish in the world... It is not a question of picking up the pieces; rather, it is about letting them entirely dissolve. And from there, in a world where our most valued hopes have disappeared, we begin to find a new way, drawing on fresh inspiration to create anew those life-sustaining dreams and ambitions even in the face of unforeseen forces and obstacles.

Things are not good, and they will likely get worse. The process of grieving allows us to move past the pain of wanting things at the global and national scale to be different, and reinvest ourselves into what we can do on smaller scales - our city, our community, our family and ourselves - as the site of transformative action. The dream of a humane and stable world is still worth striving for, but first we need to see with clear eyes what can be done in the world we are waking up into, and for that clarity we first must release the expectations and hopes of yesterday that no longer fit in the world as it is today.

The Leader

In classical literature, the Lung is spoken of as akin to the Executive Branch of a government, handing out laws and decrees. It is said: 肺者，相傅之官，治節出焉  "As for the Lung, it is the Prime Minister, regulations and laws come from it." 

The Emperor is the ruler of the kingdom, and the Prime Minister is the public face of the empire.  In the case of our body, the Heart is the Emperor – a role that, like any monarchy, is a ceremonial, symbolic office of power, not the one making the calls on day-to-day governing. Those responsibilities fall to other organs, specifically the Lung as the Prime Minister, who is responsible for creating law and order in accordance with the will of the heart. In this way, the Lung more than the heart correlates to the role of a President in the modern world. This is the person in charge of charting the course through a changing world in alignment with national values and aspirations, whose job is to keep citizens in a state of peace and harmony. The particular values and principles guiding the Leader are the "Heart" of a country, sometimes symbolized by a real figurehead in the form of a King, Queen or Emperor, and sometimes taking the form of sacred documents: a constitution, religious text or even the continuous revelation of mediums.

So what happens when the President or "Leader," symbolized by the Lungs, is no longer taking cues from the Heart? The Heart is the truest and deepest aspect of ourselves, and so the winnowing process of the lungs - deciding what to take in and what to expel - is determined by a deep conversation with the Heart to understand what truly nourishes our being. Without that, we find ourselves letting go of valuable, life-giving nutrients and taking in toxic, burdensome waste. 

The Chinese character for "grief," 悲 bēi, depicts two people with their backs to one another and a heart in the middle. It is the pain of people turning their backs on each other and their hearts. Grief is the process through which we recognize and acknowledge how we personally or collectively have turned away from our hearts, and by letting go of those pains which divide us, we can begin to come face-to-face with what has led us to feelings of separation. When we once again begin listening to what our heart is asking of us, we can bring things back into balance.

Without an upright leader in the visible position of power, when instead there we have a leader who refuses to acknowledge societal division as something to grieve and reconcile, but instead sees polarization as a problem to be solved with force where one side come out on top, this is a case of the Lung losing connection to what is vital and nourishing to us, a disconnect from the Heart. In this case, it is up to each of us individually to do the work of reconnecting to our Heart and deepest aspirations internally. And the first step is grief. 

An At-home Practice:

Try this simple breathing exercise: Wherever you are, take a few slow, deep breaths and notice if and where the breath catches - in your chest? Your throat? Your solar plexus? Wherever it might be, feel into the blockage and take a few breaths to invite any emotion held there to present itself. You might be surprised to find how readily a sensation, thought, and/or emotion comes to mind about some circumstance you badly wish could change—almost like you're "holding your breath" waiting to see if it will. If you feel comfortable to do so, try instead to give what is stuck a space to move on, which might involve whatever emotion or thought pattern coming to the surface—and even feeling more distressing—which was why it was held so tight in the first place. But when we trust in our lungs, taking slow deep breaths, these stuck emotions can begin to emerge through tears, sighs, exclamations, body movements or some other way. Whatever happens, it is okay to let the pain of our experience wash through our bodies, holding on to those parts that still nourish us, and allowing the rest to flow out with our breath.

When we do this practice, we make space not only for our lungs to breathe more deeply, but also to listen more closely to our heart: what part of our experience is causing this pain and upwelling of grief?hat does that say about who we are, what we need and what we cannot accept? Turning back towards our heart—even in a world where many have turned away from their own hearts and each other—we can go out into the world with a clear sense of value and begin to draw in those experiences, relationships, and skills that inspire us and feed our sense of vitality to do the work that badly needs to be done in the world.